Carnival Fantasy Feb 16-21st Review

[ktpc2005]

Hello all, I usually like to do reviews right away but I was a little busy. A little background, I have been on 3 cruises: Celebrity Horizon, Norwegian Dawn, and the 2nd sailing of the Norwegian Gem. I tried out Carnival because I got gift certificates from Thank you points for trying out one of the new Citibank accounts ( I work for Smith Barney), the price was right, and we wanted to see Mardis Gras in NOLA. On our cruise it was my DW, a good friend, and myself.

 

Pre-Cruise: We took United from Providence via O'hare to NOLA the day before the cruise. Its a good thing because United left my bag in Chicago and as the United rep in the baggage offfice, I am glad you came in a day early or you would have not had your luggage. I received my luggage at the hotel at 10pm that night after it came on the next flight. We stayed at the Wyndham Riverfront hotel, which is right across from the port and Riverwalk. One of my DW and I's college friend who is at med school in NOLA picked us up and showed us the town. We saw our first of many parades for the week in the Krewe of Carrolton parade.

 

Embarkation Day: We slept in because we had a long day before, but when I opened the shades to hotel room, I see the Fantasy shooting up over the Riverwalk.

 

We left our hotel room at 11:30am and took a fifteen minute walk through the Riverwalk over the Erato St terminal (the front desk said it was impossible to walk to the cruise terminal, but Cruise Critic told me different). We arrived at the terminal at 11:45am and handed off our bags to the porter. Check-in went on forever and was really slow, it took 90 minutes from handing off our bags until we walked on the ship. We finally hit Empress deck on the Carnival at 1:15pm. We headed up to the buffet for lunch ( I really like NCL which has one of the sit down restaurants open on embarkation day).

 

While eating lunch, they had general knowledge trivia on the lido deck, which my DW and I won. We got all the 12 questions right and then I won the tiebreaker to win my first ship on stick.

 

While my firend and DW went to the room to check it out, I went to get our dining preference changed. I was #3 in line and was able to get changed from the late seating to the early seating.

 

Our Room:

We had an inside room on the Empress Deck. The room was mid ship which was perfect for getting to everywhere on the ship. Our third guest has his own rollaway and it did not make the room tight. The one complaint that we had about the room was that everytime after a shower, it made the room feel and smell damp. The fan in the bathroom does nothing for getting the moist air out of the room. My wife was also not a fan of the light art that was in the room under the TV. The light isnt needed and they could use the space for more practical things.....

 

 

 

 

 

More of the review to come......

[ktpc2005]

Part II

 

Dining:

Breakfast: The buffets pretty much had the same things everyday, which was ok for me because I am not picky on breakfast and it satisfied my appetite.

 

Lunch: We split between the buffets and the sit down restaurant and had good experiences at both.

 

Dinner: I am not a big fan of the set dining times because my DW and I like to eat when we want to. We had a table of 4 at the early seating in the Celebration Dining Room. Our waiter Konmurdin was great and really made the dining experience great. The problem with dinner was that the main course took 45 minutes to arrive after the appetizers and salads came out. People in our of the restaurant were really grumbling and let their opinions know to the matire d' when he made his nightly walk around. Not much was done because it kept happening each night. :mad: I would have been ok if there was a small wait between each course but the long wait really was a pain. All the food we had was good except one dish that my DW had. One night she ordered the Carnival Classic steak and the potatoes came out charred black. I know thats not something that happens on the way to the table and that was a lack of quality control on the kitchen's part.

 

Entertainment: My DW and I really enjoyed the non-broadway shows that included two comedians and a singers. Kim Harrison was my wife's favorite act. We were always able to find good seats at the show and we usually sat in the front row of the upper level.

 

Public Rooms: All the public rooms were clean and we could not really tell that the ship was built back in the 90s. I more of the fan of the newer, bigger ships.

 

Waterworks: Those water slides are really fun. My DW and I had multiple races down the racing slides and I got the pool monitior a little wet one time when I came down (thats what he gets for not paying attention :eek:) My DW was a little nervous that the twisty slide actually goes out over the edge of the ship.

 

Big Tex: Big Tex was a great cruise director. I found him to be really funny and was a great public speaker. Eventhough it was his last cruise on the Fantasy, you could never tell. I really like his Big Tex Dance Class.

 

Ports:

 

Progreso: Many people I have read on the boards give this port a bad rap. We had a very nice day in Progreso. I had had talked with Gerardo of Autoprogreso about the tours the offer and we finally came upon the Dzbitchulan ruin tour. We met Gerardo at his company's booth in the terminal who got us our wristbands for the tour. There was an unexpected gesture that they welcomed me to Progreso:

 

We got our tags and then took the bus into town. We toured around the markets and took the double decker bus around town until we got on our tour. The tour was great and we had a really good time.

 

Cozumel: We won the port parking lottery in Cozumel. With three Carnival ships in port that day, we docked at Punta Langosta in downtown Cozumel instead on Punta Maya. We toured the shopping area and then headed to Playa Uvas where I had a reservation for some snorkeling. We had a really nice snorkeling tour and layed on the beach for the day.

 

Part III to come later........

[Lv2Camp&Cruise]

Great review. We sailed the Fantasy in October of last year and really enjoyed the trip.

[hogwildcruzers]

Waiting for more....really enjoy your down to earth and honest review....we sailed on the Fantasy in 07' before she went into dry dock, and now we will be back on her in less than 2 months...April 18.

[ktpc2005]

Part III

 

Disembarkation: Disembarkation was a breeze. The self-disembarkation started at 7:30am, but we took our time and used self-disembarkation around 8:30 right before they called general disembarkation. It took about 15 minutes to get from the ship's door to the taxi cab. Carnival was pushing everyone to use general disembarkation and not the self assist. I love the self-assist and use it whenever I can.

 

Post Cruise: We stayed the night at the Hilton St Charles Avenue which was a great hotel right on the parade route. We were able to see the Krewe of Isis and Krewe of Tucks parade in the afternoon. We then went outside for a rest and came back out for the four hour long Krewe of Endymion parade which was an experience in itself. We got to see grand marshal Kid Rock and bank REO Speedwagon rolling down St Charles Ave.

We ended up with a lot of beads; over 500 beads, 4 dozen cups, 5 footballs, and a couple of dolls......

 

We flew home to Rhode Island on Sunday afternoon.

 

Passengers: There was a wide mix of people on the cruise. The cruise had 600 kids on the cruise. I met a good number of people from New England who were on winter break like us (my wife is a teacher and we can only travel on certain weeks). There were a lot of local people on the cruise from Louisiana and also a lot of people on their first cruise. We were carrying our soda through the check in lines and we had 28 people stop us and say that brining your own soda is really good idea....... My wife was surprised to find that a lot the kids we met just took a week off from school even though they are in class, and being a teacher this is something she does not like to see.....

 

 

Overall Impression: We had a pretty good time on the cruise. We may travel on Carnival again, but we like NCL cruises better because they fit our lifestyle more. The Carnival Fantasy is the perfect cruise for this itinerary and it was really enjoyed our time. If the price and itinerary were right we may consider taking Carnival again, but you may call me an NCL cheerleader and I really like cruising with them (flamesuit on just in case).

 

 

Any questions let me know......

[KroozFoolz]

Thanks for posting your review. You embarked the day they kicked us off.

 

FYI, Carnival has started implementing Open Seating Dinner on some of their ships.

Open Seating DiningDinner 5:45pm-9:30pm

Implementation Dates

Carnival Legend 6/29/08

Carnival Liberty 11/01/08

Carnival Sensation 2/26/09

Carnival Paradise 3/20/09

Carnival Miracle 3/29/09

Carnival Elation 4/26/09

Carnival Conquest 4/26/09

Carnival Pride 4/27/09

Carnival Spirit 6/03/09

 

Open Seating Dining

The Open Seating Dining option allows the guests the opportunity to dine in the Main Dining Room anytime between 5:45pm and 9:30pm. Guests who choose Open Seating are invited to dine when and with whom they choose each evening. The guests will be able to walk up to the dining room during those times and request to be seated.

 

https://www.bookccl.com/irman/Booking_Procedures_Policies/sections/shipboard/DiningOnboard_master.html

[ktpc2005]

I did read about that when research Carnival.

 

Other things that I did not like:

 

all the activities around the pool area. I like to sit by the pool and relax. I not a big fan of activities like the hairy chest contests of the world. Some would say that you can sit on the upper decks, but on this cruise the wind was blowing 20-30 knots at sea and it made hard to sit up there. The serenity lounge would be another option, but chair hogs were in full force on our cruise.

 

I also missed having something like NCL's Blue Lagoon, their 24 hour resturant. The 24 hr pizza and ice cream are nice but they get old after a while.

[ShannonP]

Regardless of how you enjoyed the cruise, I'm sure glad to hear that you had fun in our fair city. Mardi Gras is something that everyone should experience at least once in their lifetime. Glad you got to see Endymion...it's my favorite.:D

 

I'll be on the Fantasy soon with my daughter and some of her friends celebrating their graduation....can't wait!

 

Thanks for the review.

[amberc]

We were on this cruise as well, and it was really windy on the top decks. The Serenity deck was perfect (when you could find chairs)..LoL...We had a fabulous time on this cruise, though!!!

 

Also, we were in the Jubilee Dining Room and never had issues with getting the food.

[VolzCruiser]

Thanks for a well balanced review and it is good to hear what other that have cruised other lines think after sailing with Carnival

[halos]

Great well balanced review!! If you do decide to give CCL another whirl, try a Spirit Class ship. Of all the cruises I have taken, our Fantasy cruise was my least favorite.

[ktpc2005]

Regardless of how you enjoyed the cruise, I'm sure glad to hear that you had fun in our fair city. Mardi Gras is something that everyone should experience at least once in their lifetime. Glad you got to see Endymion...it's my favorite.:D

 

I'll be on the Fantasy soon with my daughter and some of her friends celebrating their graduation....can't wait!

 

Thanks for the review.

 

 

I really enjoyed the city. Everyone was really nice to us and made us feel at home. We met some nice people along the parade route who were willing to share their space and food. Endymion was an experience all in its own, the floats just kept coming and the beads just kept flying. The recession looks like it has not effected the Mardis Gras bead market.